


Reinvent Love

by Angelic_fangirl



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst, Bisexual Richie Tozier, F/M, Fluff, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, M/M, Minor stenbrough, Running Away, Two boys falling in love, What else is new, canon timeline but fuck pennywise, homlessness, it's a mix of both, pennywise can go choke so he wasn't able to make it to this fic, richie's humor is a warning of its own, shame really, so all characters are 18 or up, some benverly, the au where they run away but with a fun twist, the gayness of this all is almost unreal, the losers don't know each other, there's a possibility for some sexy times, they meet for the first time
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-02-07 05:44:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12834561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelic_fangirl/pseuds/Angelic_fangirl
Summary: The day Eddie Kaspbrak ran away from home was the day he met Richie Tozier.





	1. Not quite sure. Probably

**Author's Note:**

> we all know i have better things to do and other fics to finish, but what can i do when inspiration hits me like a nuke? nothing but write it down and publish it before somebody else gets the same idea.

**1.**

 

The day had started out like any other, but it didn’t end the same way. Eddie had woken up at eight a.m to his mother knocking on his door, well scratch that, banging on his door. The last two years hadn’t been the best between the two of them, and Eddie knew the reason why.

 

Coming out of the closet as gay wasn’t easy, especially in a town like Derry, especially if your mother was Sonia Kaspbrak. And while she used to have a tight grip on Eddie, controlled his every move, the grip had loosened its hold towards his teenage years, until he finally broke free and decided to live his life the way he wanted. That didn’t suit Sonia Kaspbrak well, and she did the best she could to make Eddie see that she was right, he was wrong. She didn’t all she could to convince Eddie he was just sick, and if he’d let her help him, he’d get better. He’d get over this. Well, too bad for her, Eddie didn’t want to get over it.

 

In a way Eddie’s life started the day he figuratively shook off his mother’s grip on him, but on another point of view, his life started the day he literally shook it off and escaped the terrors of his childhood.

 

Again, the day was supposed to be like any other. At least Eddie planned it to be – if he even planned his days at all. There wasn’t much planning anyway – his mother rarely let him go anywhere, made sure that he would stay strictly inside, where people wouldn’t find out about Sonia Kaspbrak’s _queer_ son and where he couldn’t spread his disease any further.

 

And it had started as a normal day, a day just like the rest of them. Eddie had gotten out of bed, taken a shower and washed his teeth, put on his clothes and went downstairs to have breakfast with his mother. They rarely spoke – his mother every once in a while reminding him that what she did was best for them, the best for _him_ , but Eddie knew the truth. She did what was best for _her_. Because after the death of Eddie’s father, Sonia Kaspbrak was never the same again. She was too scared to be lonely, scared that Eddie too would leave her.

 

It would have been a regular day, if Sonia wouldn’t have been already on an awful mood. It didn’t help that Eddie was wearing a bright pink shirt, that basically screamed _Faggot!_ , and that made her even more mad. It made her angrier than Eddie had ever seen her.

 

”I see you’ve not taken your pills,” Sonia spit out, in such a harsh way that if Eddie was still fourteen, he would have quivered and hid. But not anymore. Eddie was eighteen now – he wasn’t the scaredy fourteen year old anymore.

 

”Don’t see a reason to,” Eddie quipped back. ”I’m not sick.”

 

Sonia glared at him. ”We’re not having this conversation again. Not today – not ever.”

 

And then Eddie had said the wrong thing. He had said the G-word, describing himself with the G-word, the word his mother hated so much, and she hit him. One, hard slap on Eddie’s cheek that left a stinging feeling, even after hour or two Eddie could still feel it. How his mother didn’t love him the way he is.

 

Sonia didn’t apologize. She told him to eat his breakfast and go back to his room. And Eddie did – he ate his breakfast, even though he wasn’t hungry anymore, he ate every single bite and stomped off to his room and started to go through his drawers and closet. He took out some clothes, not too many, just enough, he took his toothbrush and toothpaste, his aspirator even though he didn’t really need it and an extra pair of shoes. And a haircomb, because that’s who Eddie was as a person.

 

The last thing Eddie did was take out his savings. All the money he had ever gotten – was it a birthday gift, or from the small summer job he had few years back at the fair, he took it all. It wasn’t much. It was hardly anything, but Eddie would get by with it. Until he’d figure out what he was going to do. He stuffed all his things into a bag and waited for Sonia to leave to run her errands and then he left too.

 

He left and not once did he look back to the house in which he grew up in.

 

After walking around for five minutes, Eddie started to have a minor panick attack. Okay, he might’ve not thought this through. He had all of seven hundred and fifty-six dollars with him and no place to go. He couldn’t stay in Derry, that was for sure. He didn’t want to stay in Derry. So what was he supposed to do? Hitch-hike a ride from a total stranger and tell them to take him far away from here? Yeah, no Eddie wasn’t doing _that_. He wasn’t feeling suicidal right now. He could always go to the bus-station and hop on a bus. Any bus, really. The next that would leave. And when he would find himself in a place _other_ than Derry, Maine, preferably not even Maine, well, he could always figure the rest out later.

 

Except that wasn’t Eddie’s style. He couldn’t just catch a bus that would take him anywhere in North-America and figure out what he would do later. He would practically be homeless. No place to go, no job and his money would run out eventually. No, he needed a plan.

 

In the end, Eddie did find himself at the bus-station, looking at the bus timetables. In an hour there would be a bus that was going to Boston. That could be one option. The ticket didn’t cost too much. There was other buses leaving before that one, but it did look promising. Eddie sat on the bench a little further away from the timetables and pulled his jacket on him tighter.

 

”So, where are you off to?” asked the only other person at the bus-station, who was leaning on to the brick-wall behind him and smoking a cigarette.

 

The boy was tall – a lot taller than Eddie, but Eddie wasn’t that tall to begin with. Eddie figured that the boy was probably around his age, maybe a year or two older. His hair was a dark mess of curls that nearly reached his shoulders and looked like he had never heard of a hairbrush. His eyes were dark, and the only way Eddie could know that from the distance between them, was because they were slightly magnified by his coke-bottle glasses, which really should have looked hideous on the boy, but didn’t. His denim jacket was old and worn out with slight paint stains here and there and his jeans were ripped. Eddie knew from just looking at the boy that he was the kind of person his mother would want him to stay away from.

 

Eddie shrugged. ”Not quite sure. Boston probably,” he said and shrinked back a little as the boy threw his cigarette away, stepped on it and walked over to where Eddie was seated.

 

”Well, that makes two of us then,” he said, sitting right next to Eddie and grinned. The boy smelled like cigarettes and cheap cologne, and Eddie knew those two scents didn’t fit together, Eddie didn’t find himself disgusted by it at all.

 

”What, you going to Boston too?” Eddie asked, a little surprised.

 

The boy cocked his head a little, his eyes looking Eddie up and down, from head to toe, making Eddie feel a little self-conscious. ”Not quite sure. Probably,” the boy answered, repeating Eddie’s words with a wide grin. ”Guess neither one of us is one hundred percent sure where were going, huh?”

 

”It sure does look like it.”

 

They sat in silence for a while, and Eddie wouldn’t have minded if the boy had looked away from him at some point. Eddie didn’t like to be stared, because everytime somebody stared at him it was as if they were silently judging him. He rarely had that problem because his mother rarely let him leave the house, but when he did he knew what people were thinking.

 

But the boy’s stare didn’t feel like he was judging. It felt more… calculating. Like he was trying to figure Eddie out. His eyes rested on Eddie’s pink shirt for a good ten seconds, before moving his eyes to look at Eddie’s snowy-white converse and then his eyes moved to Eddie’s neatly combed hair. He stared at Eddie’s face too, openly, not even trying to hide it. He stared at him long and hard, as if he was trying to count the frckles on Eddie’s cheeks or figure out the exact shade of Eddie’s eyes.

 

”So does a pretty thing like you have a name?” he asked then, after he seemed to be done looking at Eddie.

 

”No, my mom refused to give me one, so she just called me Disappointment all the time,” Eddie answered, making the boy let out a loud laugh.

 

”No way, mine too,” he laughed. ”Although she did give me a name first, before nicknaming me The Biggest Mistake Of Her Life.”

 

Eddie couldn’t help but grin at that.

 

”It’s Richie by the way,” the boy, Richie, said then after he calmed down his laughter. ”Richard Tozier, also known as the Pussy Destroyer 900.”

 

Eddie snorted. ”Yeah, I doubt that anybody calls you that,” Eddie shook his head, but managed to grin a little bit.

 

”You know, usually this is the part where you tell me your name.”

 

”It’s Eddie,” Eddie said and looked away from Richie. A bus had appeared to the stop and a woman ran to it, as if she was in a hurry. As soon as the woman had climbed into the bus and paid for her ticket, the doors closed and the bus drove away.

 

”Well Eddie Spaghettie,” Richie grinned. ”I cannot be the only one who feels like it was fate that has brought us here today.”

 

”Don’t ever call me that, ever again,” Eddie shook his head. ”And I don’t think fate has anything to do with two guys waiting for a bus at the same time.

 

”Oh but it does! Think about it: both of have no idea where were going, while seriously contemplating on going to Boston. I’m going to go ahead and take a wild guess and say that you’re about eighteen or nineteen years old, and you’ve just ran away from home, most likely because of your mother. Which is more or less the same story I have, so I’m going to go ahead and call it fate.”

 

As much as Eddie wanted to tell Richie that no, he was wrong that’s nowhere near the truth, but Richie had gotten every single thing correct. It was unreal, and if Eddie hadn’t been locked in his house for the past two years, he would have been sure that Richie was some sort of creepy stalker.

 

”Judging by your silence, I’m going to assume I was right,” Richie grinned and Eddie let out a groan, putting his head into his hands.

 

”Yeah, like one hundred percent right,” Eddie admitted and looked at Richie again who was smirking at him.

 

”No need to be ashamed baby, I have mommy issues too,” Richie said. ”I’m going to take another wild guess: mommy is a little bit homophobic, and wants to squeeze the queer out og you, so you decided to take a run for it.”

 

Eddie stared at Richie with wide eyes, unable to get a word out of his mouth. Yeah, he wanted to say he was out and proud, but that was just with his mother, a person he was supposed to be able to trust, even if in reality he couldn’t, but Richie was a complete stranger. Was it really so obvious that Eddie was into boys? If so, it could be dangerous to Eddie. It wasn’t like homosexuality was widely accepted in the US.

 

”Shut up,” Eddie muttered, no longer enjoying this conversation with Richie.

 

Richie put his hand on Eddie’s shoulder. ”Nothing wrong with that either. I’m still relating to you on that level, you know?”

 

Did Richie just come out of closet to Eddie? Who did that? Was Richie self-destructive as well as an idiot? ”Didn’t you just call yourself the Pussy Destroyer 900?” Eddie asked with a raised brow.

 

”You don’t think I can be booth Pussy Destroyer 900 _and_ Asshole Destroyer 1000 at the same time? I take that as an unofficial challenge Eddiekins,” Richie grinned and wiggled his eyebrows in a suggestive way. Eddie crinkled his nose in disgust.

 

”Don’t call me that,” Eddie just said, doing his best to ignore the rest of Richie’s sentence. Subtlety obviously wasn’t Richie’s forte.

 

”We’re getting sidetracked on our conversation here Eddie bear.” Eddie did his best not to flinch or grimace at the nickname – his mother used to call him that, and it brought up bad memories, ones he didn’t want to relive.

 

Eddie sighed. ”And what was our conversation about again?”

 

”How it’s clear as day that fate brought us together here today, and we must follow its orders,” Richie explained like it was the most obvious things in the world.

 

”And what are fate’s orders?”

 

”We go to Boston. Together. And figure out the rest later,” Richie grinned widely, making Eddie let out a quiet snort. He couldn’t deny that it did sound inviting – if he was to leave Derry, he’d rather not do it alone. He had no idea what he was going to do, neither did Richie – they could just be lost together.

 

But there was always the fact that Eddie had no idea who Richie was. The only thing he knew about Richie was his name and the fact that he apparently liked boys the way Eddie liked boys. That wasn’t much to go with – for all Eddie knew, Richie could be a murderer, a stalker or just a downright creep. Who was to say that Eddie wouldn’t wake up in a ditch with all his money gone.

 

”Why would I want to leave with you?” Eddie asked with a raised eyebrow. ”I don’t know you. For all I know you could be a murderer.”

 

”Ah shit, my cover’s blown,” Richie muttered, making Eddie chuckle. ”Why can’t you just trust the fate Eds?” Richie asked, the smile on his face never faltering.

 

”Not a big believer in fate, to be honest.”

 

Richie let out a dramatic gasp, placing his hand on his heart as if he was shocked. ”I can’t believe you would say that Eds, after fate so kindly brought us together,” Richie said, and Eddie couldn’t control the chuckle that came from his lips. ”How can I convince you to come with me without actually saying that I’m terrified of leaving and don’t want to do it alone?”

 

”Well that was a good start,” Eddie hummed. ”You know you should try to be more honest with people, instead of just coming up with bullshit stories about fate and all that jazz.”

 

”Dully noted.”

 

After that they sat in silence again. Eddie kept glancing at the watch on his wrist nearly every five minutes – half an hour to go until the bus to Boston would arrive. Richie had moved to look through the timetables with a bord expression and Eddie tried to hide the fact that he was staring.

 

Richie was strange, Eddie figured. He was talkative and loud and let out weird jokes, but he made Eddie laugh. Eddie couldn’t remember when was the last time he laughed at a person and not to a line on a book or a tv-show. Maybe Eddie just thought of Richie as a strange person because of how long it had been since he had a proper conversation with anyone. Even his mother.

 

And Richie was gorgeous. That was the other thing to Richie that Eddie had noticed. He was strange and gorgeous, and it seemed like the perfect combination, and Eddie wasn’t sure how he made it work. Eddie doubted he had ever washed his dark curls, but still they looked soft and made Eddie want to run his hand through them. His mouth was wide, but it was okay because Richie was grinning ninety percent out of the time anyway, it only made his grin look more contagious. Richie was tall and maybe a little too skinny, as if he couldn’t bother with food. A pack of cigarettes could be seen in his pocket, and Eddie blamed those for Richie’s possible uninterest in food. Or maybe he just had a fuckign good metabolism, Eddie couldn’t know.

 

”So what made you choose this day to leave?” Richie asked out of the blue, snapping Eddie from his thoughts. ”Why not leave sooner.”

 

Eddie hummed. ”My mom hit me today,” Eddie said, trying to sound casual but couldn’t hide the fact that his voice was quivering a little. ”She had never done that before – so I decided that it wasn’t worth it to stay locked in the house for the rest of my life if that’s how it’s going to be.”

 

If Richie was surprised or in any way affected by Eddie’s words, he didn’t show it. His expression stayed the same as he nodded his head once, no twice, and took the pack of cigarette’s out of his pocket.

 

Eddie grimaced as Richie took one cancer stick and put it in his mouth at the same time as he went for the lighter. Eddie’s obvious discomfort didn’t go unnoticed by Richie, who smirked at him. ”Don’t like cigarette’s, huh princess?” he asked.

 

Eddie shook his head. ”I have asthma, you asshole. Even secondary smoking literally clogs up my trachea, so no, I’m not very fond.”

 

”Well you could’ve said that earlier,” Richie said and put the cigarette away. ”You know I think we should forget about Boston. There’s a bus leaving to Connecticut in ten minutes. After that we could just go anywhere, we wouldn’t have to stay there.”

 

Eddie liked the way Richie said _we_. ”Who says we have to stay in Boston either?” Eddie asks. ”But it’s fine by me.”

 

”Connecticut it is then.”

 

By the time Eddie and Richie were comfortably seated in the bus seats and the bus had already taken off, Eddie was sure his mother had called the cops already. Richie assured them that the cops couldn’t do shit – he was eighteen, he wasn’t a kid anymore, he could make his desisions for himself. Eddie tried to take Richie’s word for it.

 

”So we get off in New Londond, right?” Eddie asked, and Richie nodded.

 

Richie sifted in his seat uncomfortably. ”Oh god, it’s going to be a long ride, isn’t it. I should’ve just smoked that cigarette, fuck your lungs.”

 

Eddie wasn’t sure when he fell asleep, but when he woke up, Richie was bouncing on his seat excitedly, while looking out the window. Trying to wake his brain up, Eddie groggily sat up straight in his seat and streched a little, attracting Richie’s attention.

 

”Morning sleeping beauty,” Richie grinned. ”You have no idea how bored I’ve been during the ride, but you looked so cute when you were sleeping that I didn’t want to wake you up.”

 

Eddie snorted. ”If you had woken me up, you’d have gotten a fist in your nose.”

 

”I doubt your cute little baby hands do any real harm Eddie-cakes.”

 

Eddie scoffed and turned his head to look out of the window. It was fall and the leaves had already fallen down from the trees, brown, red and orange replacing green as the dominant colour. It was raining now, the drops of water hitting on the bus-window, gently in a calming sort of way.

 

”An hour to go,” Richie said. ”Then we’re there.”

 

Eddie must have slept longer than he thought. ”Should I have left my mom a note?” Eddie then thought out loud, a slight feeling of worry rising in his chest. He knew his mother must be panicking, freaking out and driving the Derry cops insane. He should have left a note, telling her he’s leaving and never coming back.

 

”Nah,” Richie shook his head. ”She’s not worth it.”

 

”Maybe not, but she’s my mother. For all she knows, I could have been kidnapped.”

 

Richie shrugged. ”Yeah, but what good does it do you to worry about it now? You’re miles away from her, unless you want to hop onto a new bus just to tell her that you’re running away, there’s nothing you can do about it.”

 

Eddie knew Richie was right, but that didn’t stop him from feeling somewhat bad. His mother’s life had revolved around him for the past eighteen years, and even if in the end she didn’t desrve Eddie’s gratitude for anything, it was wrong of him to leave her to wonder what happened to him. He could die now, and she’d have no idea what happened to him.

 

”It’s still not fair for her,” Eddie huffed, crossing his arms across his chest and stared off to the front of the bus. Usually Eddie would get motion sickness while sitting so far at the end of the bus, but Richie had insisted. Besides, Eddie had slept most of the journey.

 

Richie let out a scoff. ”Well, I don’t think she was fair towards you, but you don’t see me complaining,” Richie said. ”Besides, how is it my fault that you didn’t leave her a note?”

 

”It’s not, it’s my own fault,” Eddie sighed and rested his head against the seat.

 

The next time either of them spoke was when the bus finally stopped in New London. Both of them took their bags and got out of the bus, looking around the scenery of New London.

 

”Ahh, isn’t it just like you always dremt it to be?” Richie asked with a big grin.

 

Eddie raised his brow and scoffed. ”I’ve hardly ever dreamt of New London, so I suppose it succeeds all my expectations,” he said and grimaced. ”What do we do now?”

 

Richie shrugged. ”I’m not sure.”

 

”Are you fucking serious?” Eddie asked. He probably should have spent more time coming up with some sort of plan, instead off just running away. Well, it was too late to regret it now.

 

”Don’t be like that Eddie Spaghettie,” Richie said and draped his arm around Eddie’s shoulders. ”Doesn’t it just add to the excitement, not knowing?”

 

”Well it sure is exciting.”


	2. it's the chlamydia you should be worried about

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello again! i'm back with a brand new chapter! hope ya'll enjoy it!
> 
> thank you all who bothered to leave comments and kudos to this story, it means a lot!

**2.**

 

Eddie and Richie ended up finding themselves at a semi-crappy motel. At the first look Eddie had refused to set a foot to the place, saying there could be, and probably was, all kinds of bacteria, germs in every corner. He was convinced that at least half of the rooms were covered in mold, caused by water damages and what-not. It had taken Richie twenty minutes to convince Eddie, saying that at this moment they wouldn’t find or probably couldn’t even afford much better, and this was all they had. He was, of course, right.

 

The young girl behind the counter acknowledged them with a distant hum as they entered, flipping the page of her magazine.

 

”We’d like your least moldy room please,” Richie grinned brightly, and for the first time, the girl gave them a glance, chewing her gum with a distinterested look. The amount of which she reminded Eddie of Greta Keene was alarming to him.

 

The girl smirked a little. ”Queen bed, I assume,” she said with a catty glint in her eyes.

 

Eddie didn’t like the implication in her voice. ”Umm, no two twins are just fine...”

 

”Oh well, that’s too bad then,” the girl said and pouted mockingly at Eddie. ”We only have queens left. Unless you’re gonna sleep on the floor, I don’t think you have much choice.”

 

Eddie wasn’t enjoying the way the girl talked to them, in her condesending way, and he noticed that Richie was feeling the same way. The slight clench of Richie’s fist as he faked a wide smile was enough to give it away.

 

”Eds is just playing with you,” Richie said, draping his arm around Eddie’s shoulder and pulling him close. ”The queen would be more than preferable. It can get a little cramped in a twin bed when you’re trying to get down and dirty. You know what I’m talking about,” Richie winked at the girl, who merely scoffed at him.

 

”How many nights?” she asked in a demended voice, shooting Eddie nasty glares at the corner of her eye as she tried to keep her eyes on Richie.

 

”Three,” Richie answered, bouncing on his toes.

 

”Thirty dollars.”

 

Eddie dug the money from his pocket and practically threw it at the girl’s face. She merely scoffed at them before slamming the key to their room onto the counter, before getting back to her magazine. Richie and Eddie then turned away to get to their room, but didn’t miss the girl call out the last ”Try not to get AIDS shorty!”. Neither of them paid her no mind though.

 

Their room could’ve been worse, Eddie gathered. The corners weren’t moldy or the bed damp like he had suspected. The sheets weren’t whittled away by vermin and all in all Eddie had seen worse.

 

”So you wanna get AIDS or what?” Richie asked and he sauntered over to the bed and jumped on the left side, laying down with his arms under his hands.

 

Eddie rolled his eyes and put his bag onto a nearby armchair. ”Pass,” he answered.

 

”I was joking, I don’t have AIDS,” Richie said with a grin. ”It’s the chlamydia you should be more worried about.”

 

”Jesus,” Eddie shook his head, unable to control his laughter over Richie’s stupidity.

 

Richie hummed. ”Not what they usually call me, but if that turns you on, I’m not the one to judge you based on your kinks. I have few of my own, so you’ll just have to return the favour.”

 

”As long as it’s nothing weird.”

 

It took him a couple of hours, but in the end Eddie found himself being lulled to sleep by Richie’s quiet humming. Eddie didn’t recognize the tune of the song Richie was humming to, if it was a song at all or just a tune he came up by himself, but it was peaceful and calm, and Eddie found Richie’s voice pleasant. It did surprise Eddie, how effortlessly he still could fall asleep, even though he had slept most of their trip.

 

For a moment Eddie forgot all about his mother, all about the way she seemed to hate him. In that moment none of it excisted and Eddie lived in a dream world, a pleasant one where he was happy, where the boy lying next to him was happy and he didn’t have to worry.

 

As Eddie slept, the memory of his old home disappeared almost complitely. There was no memeory of how the house smelt, the sound of his mother’s cooking or how loudly she yelled at the TV when somebody in a soap opera did something stupid. He wasn’t exactly sure of the shade of blue the walls of his room had been or whether or not his sheets were white. He wasn’t sure how many pill bottles he had in his bathroom or how many times his mother came into his room to clean.

 

But as always, dreams don’t last, and as Eddie woke up, all the things he didn’t want to think about came back to him like a storm. His house always had the distant smell of disinfectant, and the walls of his room were baby blue and his sheets were actually light grey. He had exactly thirteen different bottles of pills on his bathroom and his mother came to his room with a duster approximately two times a day.

 

The thoughts didn’t linger on Eddie’s mind long though, because he soon felt a weight pressing down on his waist-area. Opening his eyes, he noticed Richie’s arm draped over his waist, his head pressed against Eddie’s shoulder and his breathing heavy on Eddie’s neck.

 

 _How did I not notice that?_ Eddie wondered, and tried to shift next to Richie, in the attempt to go to the bathroom without waking the other boy up. His movements ended up stirring Richie though, making the other boy slowly blink his eyes open.

 

”Morning Eddie-cakes,” Richie said with a lazy smile, like he didn’t find the position he woke up in weird at all.

 

”Morning,” Eddie replied, finally being able to get up from the bed as Richie moved to lay more on his side of the bed. Making a beeline to the bathroom, Eddie slammed the door closed behind him, prefering the privacy and locking the door with him.

 

”What you don’t want company?” Richie called, laughter in his voice. ”We could save water.” Eddie decided that it was smarter to just not answer Richie.

 

Eddie quickly took of his clothes and got into the small shower. He normally didn’t like his showers too hot, but right now he felt like he needed to get all of what was Derry off his skin. He wanted to get rid of the distant scent of his previous home, of his mother and forget them forever this time. Hot water did the job better than cold.

 

Realizing that he hadn’t packed any shampoo or even soap with him, Eddie cursed quietly under his breath. He was forced to use the ones provided by the motel, but then again, it was probably better that way – the soaps Eddie used to use were all from Derry, reminding him of that God-forsaken place. He didn’t want anything from Derry on him again.

 

(His clothes could be the only exception for now.)

 

(And maybe Richie.)

 

”You were there for a long time,” Richie mused as Eddie stepped out of the bathroom, fresh clothes on, drying his hair into the towel. ”Almost feared that you might’ve slipped and fell.”

 

”I think you might’ve heard that dumbass,” Eddie rolled his eyes as he sat on the bed where Richie was still laying, the clothes from yesterday still on him. ”You’re not gonna have a shower?” he asked, earning a humm out of Richie.

 

”I should, shouldn’t I? Too bad that my hunger beats my need to take a shower,” Richie said, getting up from the bed. ”Which wasn’t that big to begin with. Come on then Eddie Spagetti, let’s go find us some cheap affordable food.”

 

”To think of it, cheap and affordable mean pretty much the same thing.”

 

* * *

 

After Richie and Eddie had had their breakfast in a small diner, they decided that they didn’t necessarily want to spend their time at the motel, so they walked around the city. It wasn’t all that bad, better than Derry anyway and Eddie probably wouldn’t have minded staying there. But Richie seemed to want to do something different.

 

”So tell me Eddie, where do you want to go next?” he asked as he kicked a pebble on the ground.

 

”Umm, I really haven’t thought abou it,” Eddie admitted and bit his lip. ”Judging by the look on your face, you have?”

 

Richie hummed. ”More or less, yes. You obviously have no idea what you’re doing, do you?”

 

”Well considering that my whole running away thing was sort of a last minute type of thing, no, no I don’t,” Eddie shook his head. ”I take it that you had planned on it for a little longer?”

 

Richie shurgged his shoulders before shooting Eddie a large grin. ”About a year. Just enough time to gather up some money and stuff. I thought about saving up for a car, but it would have taken a lot more time.”

 

 _And we would have never met_ , Eddie thought but kept it to himself. Instead, he just nodded and casted his gaze onto his feet.

 

”It’s funny how we just sort of ran off together, and we’re complete strangers,” Richie mused after a while, his hands in his pockets, as he sat down on a park bench and waited for Eddie to sit down next to him.

 

”Yeah, I guess it is,” Eddie agreed, sitting down on the other end of the bench, not really wanting to break Richie’s personal bubble, even if the other boy didn’t have any problem breaking his. Richie laughed as he watched Eddie sit so far away, almost cautiously, so he slid down the bench so they were sitting next to each other.

 

”Tell me about yourself Eddie,” he then said, turning in his seat so he was facing Eddie.

 

Eddie licked his lips. ”What do you want to know?” he then asked, watching as Richie shrugged.

 

”Anything. Everything. Yes, I want to know everything.”

 

And Eddie did. He told Richie everything that there was to know about him, without a moment of hesitation. He told about his father, how he had died, about his mother and how she had manipulated him throughout most of his life, feeding him lies about illnesses and allergies, making him afraid of almost everything. Eddie told Richie how even to this day bacteria and germs were a big phobia of his, even if he knew most of his illnesses were just lies. He told Richie about how he had spent most of his life completely friendless, how his mother wouldn’t let him out of the house after she had found out about his sexuality, how she would try to do everything to squeeze the gay out of him. He told Richie how he had always wanted to be a doctor, and even had the grades to get into a good University, but his mother never let him go.

 

Eddie told Richie about how his favourite color was bright green, like the birch leaves in Junes when the sun shines through them, how his favourite food had always been chicken pasta. He told Richie how his favourite movie was Grease and how he used to have a friend, a boy called Bill who moved away and since then he had had nobody. He told Richie everything, because Richie listened to his every word with a smile on his face, throwing a cheesy joke here and there, and nobody had ever listened to him like Richie had. Nobody had ever listened to him _at all_ , because he had never had anybody to talk to anyway.

 

After Eddie had told Richie everything and anything, he asked Richie the same question. Richie, being the talkative blabber-mouth he was, did as he was asked, leaving some holes into the story, but Eddie didn’t pry, because there must’ve been a reason why Richie didn’t tell him.

 

By the end of the day, they knew everything there was to know about each other. Eddie knew that Richie’s favourite color was the color of midnight sky and that he too came from a shitty family, where his mother was severly alcoholic and his father never home. Eddie knew that Richie had started smoking when he was only eleven, after finding his mothers stash. Eddie knew that Richie had the GPA of a genious, and the reason why he hadn’t left Derry sooner was because his grandma had gotten seriously ill, and she had been the only person Richie had ever really cared about.

 

Maybe Eddie was romanticizing the whole situation, or maybe he was being a little too over-dramatic – but he honestly felt like Richie was the first person he liked. Discounting Bill of course, but Bill’s face had gotten blurry in Eddie’s mind, the only memories being Bill’s name, laughter and the stutter he had.

 

And now, there was Richie, Richie who was a little too hyperactive and all smiles and the smell of cigarettes. And Eddie enjoyed Richie’s company – a little too much, he thought. He hoped he wouldn’t end up liking Richie more than he does now, because that could cause problems that Eddie didn’t want to deal with.

 

* * *

 

How Richie and Eddie ended up on the backseat of a stranger’s car on the way to Portland, Eddie wasn’t sure. All he knew was that after they had spent their three nights in the motel, they needed a plan. What were they going to do next?

 

Richie had about three times more money with him than Eddie, thanks to him having planned his escape from Derry way longer than Eddie had. Richie said that it wouldn’t hurt for them to switch places after short periods of time – they didn’t have to stay in one place all the time, at least not right away.

 

(Eddie liked the sound of Richie saying _us, we, our_ , because that meant he wasn’t going to ditch Eddie, not yet at least.)

 

So why were they on the backseat of a stranger’s car? Well Richie had been talking a little too loudly while they were at a diner, practically yelling about how they needed a way to go to Portland. Eddie had asked Richie why Portland, and Richie had just shrugged and answered

 

”I’ve never been there before.”

 

Cue a pretty red-headed girl and a tall dark skinned guy to come up to them and tell them how they could give them a ride. Apparently they were headed there too, since the girl’s aunt lived there, and insisted that it wouldn’t be a bother.

 

Richie of course was thrilled by this, Eddie… not so much. He wasn’t sure if he was comfortable enough to get into a car with two strangers, but they, Mike and Beverly, seemed nice enough.

 

(And Eddie was sure that even though they had known each other for only three days, he would follow Richie to the end of the universe, with only minimum questions asked.)

 

And so now Eddie was sitting on the backseat of Mike’s car while Beverly played her favourite music, Bowie and Metallica mostly, while Richie talked their ears off.

 

”I never asked by the way,” Mike said at one point, lowering the volume of the music, despite Beverly’s complaining. ”Why do you two need to go to Portland?”

 

”Honestly Mike my man, that should have been the first question you asked us,” Richie said with a grin. ”But to answer your question – we’ve never been there, so it must be a good place to go.”

 

Beverly laughed at this. ”If that’s your philosophy, I don’t advice you to follow it. That would mean that launching yourself into a black hole is a good idea, just because you’ve never been in one.”

 

Eddie laughed out loud at Beverly’s words. Beverly and Mike were both older than him – Beverly being nineteen, the same age as Richie, and Mike being twenty. Maybe it made him feel a little young compared to the rest three of them, but it wasn’t like you could tell it anyway. Both Beverly and Richie seemed to be childish enough to come across as sixteen year olds at times.

 

”We’re probably stop in Ohio, go to a motel and sleep there the night,” Mike said. ”It’s forty-three hour drive to Portland, and we still have forty more to go.”

 

Eddie sat the rest of the drive to Ohio mostly quiet, looking out of the window and listening to Richie’s voice mixed with the music playing on the backround. Richie seemed to get along with Beverly exceptionally well – they both smoked cigarette’s throughout the drive, opening the windows every time they did so. They all so seemed share somewhat a similar sense of humor, though Beverly’s was a little bit more mature than Richie’s.

 

A thought crossed Eddie’s mind, a thought that buried itself deep. Richie seemed to like Beverly a lot – more than he seemed to like Eddie. Or at least it came off as though they did – they got along like they had known each other for their entire lives, and Eddie shouldn’t have cared so much. He and Richie had known each other _three fucking days_. Richie was allowed to like other people, for fuck’s sake. Just because he and Eddie had left Derry together, seemed to want to stick with the other for the time being, didn’t mean they had to be the other’s _favourite_ person. If Richie wanted to like this Beverly so much more than he liked Eddie, it was none of Eddie’s business.

 

But then came the fear that Richie would want to ditch Eddie for Beverly. Maybe Richie and Beverly will fall in love and Richie decides that he wants to stay with Beverly in Portland. Or Beverly and Richie leave Portland together, and Richie wouldn’t want Eddie to come with them.

 

It was all stupid thinking, Eddie should learn to shut his mind.

 

”So why were you in Connecticut anyway?” Eddie heard Richie asking the two.

 

”Mike had some family there, and his cousin or something had a birthday,” Beverly answered. ”He asked me to tag along so he wouldn’t be too alone.”

 

”Oh, so you two are together?”

 

Mike shook his head with a laugh. ”No, no, no, definitely not. Bev’s in a happy relationship, I ain’t coming between the perfect couple.

 

Beverly slapped Mike’s arm lightly with a smile on her face. ”Yeah, his name is Ben and we’ve been together since we were like preteens. He’s a year younger than me, so he’s the same age as Eddie.” Eddie started to properly pay attention after hearing his name, but when he realized that it wasn’t anything that important, he looked out of the window again.

 

”You okay there Spagetti?” Richie asked, and Eddie turned his gaze to meet Richie’s, who was leaning slightly closer to him, as much as he could while having the seatbelt on. The seatbelt wouldn’t have been a problem if Eddie hadn’t demandced that Richie put it on – he had refused to step into the vehicle if he didn’t.

 

”Fine, just tired.”

 

Richie grinned widely. ”I swear, all you ever do is sleep.”

 

”The best way to spend your time, wouldn’t you agree?” Eddie answered with a quirk of his eyebrow.

 

By the time they found a motel – a much cleaner and comfier looking than the last one – Eddie didn’t feel particularly tired anymore. Not that he had felt it before anyway, he had just lied to Richie because he didn’t want to admit the real reason behind his quietness, but the amount of energy Eddie felt flowing through his body didn’t go unnoticed by his companions as he _leaped_ out of the car and almost fell in the process.

 

”I thought you were tired,” Beverly mused with an amused expression.

 

”Yes I was, but it would appear that I no longer am,” Eddie answered, and Beverly chuckled.

 

This time it was an older man behind the counter, but he was a lot more pleasant than the girl in Connecticut. He didn’t let out any rude remarks, did his job and left them alone. To Eddie it was an A+ performance.

 

”Queen or two twins?” the guy asked Richie as he was paying for their room.

 

Richie didn’t hesitate before answering. ”Queen is just fine thank you.” Yes, Eddie’s heart skipped a beat, but he quickly ignored it. He didn’t want to think about why Richie would get them a queen bed, when really twins were just fine, Beverly and Mike had gotten twin beds. Richie probably didn’t mean anything by it.

 

The guy may not have said anything, but he did glance at Eddie after Richie answered his question. Eddie almost cast his eyes to the floor, but the guy never opened his mouth to say some rude comment, didn’t look at Eddie again, just accepted the money from Richie and moved on.

 

”You don’t mind me getting us a queen, do you?” Richie then asked as they walked towards their room. It was just across the hall from Bev and Mike, who had gone ahead.

 

Eddie paid no mind when Richie draped his arm over his shoulders. ”Should I mind?” he asked. ”Unless you plan on cruelly taking advantage of me while I sleep, no I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the two of us sleeping in the same bed.

 

Richie laughed at his words. ”Don’t worry Eds – I prefer my partners awake and willing,” he said, and Eddie again ignored the leap his heart made when Richie squeezed his shoulder.

 

”It must’ve been centuries when you’ve had sex then – can’t think of anybody who’d willingly have sex with you.”

 

”Well, I can think of one,” Richie said and smirked. ”I’m sure you wouldn’t mind.”

 

Eddie scoffed and took the key from Richie’s hand. ”Please, hell would have to freeze ten times over before I’ll willingly put my hands on you.” Eddie stopped in front of their room and opened the door, revealing a lot nicer room than the one they had shared before.

 

”You say that now,” Richie said as he pushed past Eddie to the room and jumped on the bed – like he had done the last time – and grinned at Eddie. ”But just you wait Edmund Kaspbrak, one day you’ll be begging to put your hands on me. But don’t worry, i won’t stop you.”

 

Eddie just rolled his eyes in response and locked himself into the bathroom, doing his best to hide his blush as he told Richie he’d be taking a shower.


	3. all's not right in spaghetti-town

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's a little shorter chapter, but i'm probably going to start making longer chapters from now on... so they'll take a bit longer to write, but whatever.
> 
> i hope you like this chapter and thank you for all the positive feed-back i've gotten so far!

**3.**

 

If there was one thing Eddie had noticed during the couple of days, it was that Richie was severly addicted to cigarettes. He would smoke one or two every couple of hours, his hands shaking if he went a minute longer without one. Eddie wouldn’t have paid it no mind, really – okay, he would have, because travelling with a dude who was addicted to nicotine and smelled like the beginning of lung cancer wasn’t fun. But he wasn’t going to say anything about it until they were on a highway from Ohio to Portland, a thirty-six hour drive ahead of them (they were seriously considering staying another night at a motel) and Richie was out of cigarettes.

 

It wasn’t bad at first, because Beverly did still have some. And Beverly wasn’t that big of an addict, claiming that she had gone three days without cigarettes last month and everything was fine.

 

”I mean I could quit,” Beverly had answered when Eddie asked the question. ”But I just don’t want to.”

 

But at some point, Richie had managed to smoke all of Beverly’s cigarettes and was shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

 

”How do you sleep at night?” Mike asked Richie, eyeing the way Richie moved around in the back seat. ”I mean, you can sleep all night without smoking, right?”

 

”Yes, I can,” Richie answered, sounding slightly irritated. ”I’m asleep so I don’t have to think about it. But would ya look at that: I’m awake now. And I’m thinking about it.”

 

”Well why don’t you try sleeping?” Beverly suggested.

 

”He has a cigarette every night before he goes to bed,” Eddie answered before Richie could. He didn’t mean to sound so annoyed – it was Richie’s addiction, therefore his probelm. But if Eddie was going to have to travel with him, he was going to have to get some nicotine patches to the older boy, as soon as possible, because otherwise this was going to be unbearable.

 

”Don’t sound so angry Eddie Spaghetti,” Richie whined and reached his arms over to Eddie, trying to get a hold of the smaller boy, who just swatted his hands away.

 

”Get your hands away from me and put your god damn seatbelt on Richie! What if we get into a car crash!”

 

”You know if we get into a car crash at this speed, you’re going to die anyway, so it doesn’t matter,” Richie said, putting his hand in Eddie’s hair and messing it a bit. There really wasn’t much to mess anyway – Eddie hadn’t bothered with his hair since they had left Derry, hence why it must’ve looked more like a birdnest than anything.

 

”That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard, in my entire life,” Eddie said. ”And I had a kid in my class who thought rocks had cell-structure.”

 

”Not all of us can be some sort of biology geniouses like you, Eddie!” Richie said. ”Some people make simple mistakes like that.”

 

Eddie rolled his eyes. ”I’m not a biology genious, I just have common sense. Only living things have cell-structure, that’s like the most basic thing – and even children know that rocks aren’t living things.”

 

”How do you know that?” Richie challenged.

 

”Because they don’t have fucking cell-structure, that’s how!”

 

Their bickering went on for a long time, with Mike and Beverly occasionally taking sides or laughing at their remarks. When they finally had a toilet break and Richie could get his cigarettes after six hours, Beverly noted how he hadn’t complained about the cigarettes since they had started their banter with Eddie.

 

* * *

 

”One day, Eddie my love,” Richie said as he looked at a painting in a hotel lobby. ”I’m going to paint you like that.”

 

The painting may or may not have been of a man and female, wearing really nothing but small pieces of fabrik to cover their private parts and were looking like they were about to do some unspeakable things. In Eddie’s opinion, it didn’t belong to a hotel lobby, no matter how small hotel, but Richie seemed to have taken quite the shining on the piece of art.

 

How they ended up in a hotel this time, you might ask? Because it turned out that a room for four in that one particular hotel was actually cheaper than two bedrooms at a motel. Eddie wasn’t sure whether or not he believed Beverly when she said it, because it could’ve been that she just wanted a little better bed to sleep in for once.

 

”Okay, so it’s one king and two twins,” Beverly said after she and Mike had gotten their room. To Eddie it didn’t matter if the room ended up being cheaper or not – Beverly had promised to pay for it, because it was her idea after all. And while Eddie knew he couldn’t really afford to say no when people offered to pay for him – literally – he did feel bad about it. They had hitch-hiked a ride from Mike and Bev and now they were making them pay for their accommodation. No matter how many times they insisted that it was fine and that it didn’t matter, Eddie couldn’t help but try to find solutions to how he was ever going to pay them back.

 

”We can take the king,” Richie offered before Eddie could open his mouth. Eddie tried his best to ignore the smile that appeared on Beverly’s face after Richie had said it.

 

”We figured you’d want it,” she said, throwing a wink at Eddie. ”But please do try to keep down while you’re at it – there’s other people sleeping in the same room as you.”

 

”Keep what down?” Eddie asked, dumbfounded. Based on the laugh Richie let out, Eddie felt like it was somehting he should’ve figured out just fine.

 

”She’s talking about fucking,” Mike said and grinned at Eddie, tilting his head to the side a little bit. ”We’d appreciate if you’d try to not be too loud – so we could catch some rest.”

 

Eddie’s eyes widened at the implication. He and Richie definitely weren’t having sex – not now and not ever. They were _friends_ at best – if you could even call a person you’ve only known for so little a friend ( although if you trust a person enough to run away from home with them to the great unknown, you must think of them as something alike to a friend). The fact that Beverly and Mike thought that they were anything more than friends… Eddie didn’t want to think about it.

 

”We’re not – were not _fucking_ ,” Eddie denied immediately. ”Why would you think that!”

 

”Ouch Eddie, there’s no need to be that harsh,” Richie snickered. ”We could totally be fucking – you just gotta let a guy know that you’re interested.”

 

Beverly looked confused for a second, before realization hit her. ”Oh so you’re not… Oh my fucking god! I’m so stupid. I totally thought you two were a pair.”

 

”What?” Eddie asked, his voice coming out as more of a squeal. ”We’re totally not dating!” At this point they were already on the second floor, where their room was supposed to be, and some other guests gave Eddie weird looks as they were walking down the corridors.

 

”Could’ve fooled me,” Mike hummed, grinning as he opened the door to their room.

 

”And I’m trying not to be to too offended by the disgusted tone on your voice when you said that,” Richie said. ”Am I not good enough for you Eddie bear? Come on, you can be honest.”

 

Eddie huffed and sat on the armchair in the room, not answering Richie’s question. The room was, unsurprisingly, a lot bigger and a lot nicer than the ones they’d had in the motels. The feeling of guilt banged in Eddie’s chest again, thinking that he and Richie should’ve just gone to some motel and then try to catch a bus to Portland. Beverly and Mike were being way too generous.

 

”So what do we owe you?” Richie asked, changing the subject when it became clear that Eddie wasn’t continuing the conversation.

 

”What do you mean?” Beverly asked.

 

”We can’t just let you pay for our room and drive us all the way to Portland without any sort of compensation,” Richie answered. ”Just tell me how much and we’ll pay.”

 

Beverly laughed and sat down on one of the twin beds. ”Nonesense – I know you shouldn’t rely on the kindness of strangers, but we’re hardly strangers at this point. All the compensation we need is your good company.”

 

”That just sounds way too good to be true,” Eddie pointed out. ”You’re some sort of mass murderers, aren’t you?”

 

”Oh no, the secret’s out,” Mike said, putting his hands up and laughing. ”No but really. Pay for the gas for the rest of the trip and we’re even. It’s not even a big of a deal – we were going to Portland anyway, so you’re being nothing but some good company.”

 

 

”Are we friends Eddie-bear?” Richie asked, in the middle of the night when Eddie was trying to sleep. Mike and Beverly had both already dosed off, Beverly snoring lightly and Mike letting out gently snuffles.

 

”What kind of question is that?” Eddie asked, not opening his eyes as he laid on his side, his back turned to Richie. ”And never call me Eddie-bear again.” Eddie might not have been fond of nicknames, but Eddie-bear was by far the worst Richie had come up with – mostly because that’s what Eddie’s mom used to call him.

 

”What kind of answer is that?”

 

Eddie rolled his eyes. ”Why are you asking?”

 

”Is that your way of saying, no we’re not friends?” Richie asked again, and Eddie wasn’t sure if he was imagining it or not, but he was sure that his voice sounded a little off, like he was disappointed by it.

 

Eddie sighed and turned on the bed so he was facing Richie. He hadn’t even noticed how close the other boy was, but as he turned around, there was only inches between their faces. ”No. I do think we’re friends,” he said then, feeling as though he should try to move back a little bit, so he wouldn’t be so overwhelmingly close to Richie. ”Do you think we’re friends?”

 

Richie nodded his head like an excited child. ”Yes. We’re friends,” he said with a smile before closing his eyes. ”Just wanted to make sure. I’ve never had a friend before.”

 

Before Eddie could answer, Richie was already snoring. It was probably a good thing, because he wouldn’t have known what to say.

 

* * *

 

Arriving to Portland was a relief and a panic attack all at once for Eddie. It was relief, because his sitting muscles were sore and he didn’t think he could stand another hour in a car. And the panic attack came because he didn’t know what they were going to do now.

 

”So… what now?” Eddie asked Richie as they sat on the couch at Beverly’s house. She had of course invited them to dinner, to which Richie had immediately said yes. Eddie, though hungry, wasn’t sure if he could take anymore from Beverly, but she insisted.

 

They would also be meeting Beverly’s boyfriend, Ben, who would be joining them. For the last thirty minutes of the ride, Beverly hadn’t shut up about the boy: Ben had moved to Portland when they were young, and Ben had had an obvious kind of crush to Beverly – which she had found cute of course. They had started of friends, but during their early teens, Beverly had started to feel the same way towards Ben and the rest was history.

 

”I’m not exactly sure, I haven’t thought that far,” Richie shrugged. ”We could stay here for a while. Try to earn more money and then find a better place than Portland.”

 

”What is a better place than Portland?” Beverly asked as she and Mike came from the kitchen to join them to the living room.

 

”Just thinking what we’re going to do next,” Eddie answered. ”This road trip is going to be cut short if we don’t get more money soon.”

 

”I think we should start making sex tapes – they pay off good,” Richie said, making Eddie punch him in the arm while Beverly and Mike laughed.

 

”Yes, I think I’d pay to see that,” Beverly mused. ”I’d love it if you’d stay in Portland – even for a little while. Try to find some job that pays off remotely well.”

 

Richie nodded. ”My thoughts exactly. Too bad that you can rent a room at a motel for only so long before the money you have runs out.”

 

”My grandfather has a farm with plenty of extra rooms – you could live there, for a while. Until you find a small temporary apartment or leave. It’s just an offer – I live there too, you could help out at the farm if you don’t find a proper job.”

 

Eddie smiled gratefully at Mike. ”Thanks Mike, but I feel like it’s too much. You literally just drove us for thirty-six hours and paid for our hotel room – I just don’t want to be a bother,” he admitted.

 

”Eddie, in a situation that we’re in, when a guy offers you a roof and walls to shelter you from the cold, you take it,” Richie said to him before smiling to Mike. ”We’d love that Mike – honestly you’re too good for shitty people like Eddie and I.” Eddie huffed and crossed his arms over his chest while Richie messed up his hair.

 

Mike laughed a little. ”You got that right. But seriously Eddie, it’s no bother. My grandfather is a people’s person.”

 

* * *

 

Turned out that Beverly wasn’t over-selling her boyfriend – Ben turned out to be just as amazing and kind as she had described him as.

 

”Can we keep him, Eddie please,” Richie begged Eddie as he clung onto the laughing boy.

 

”No way Richie, hands off,” Beverly said, swatting Richie’s hands off her boyfriend. ”He’s mine and you’re not taking him away from me.”

 

Ben worked at the local bookstore and he was amazing enough to promise Eddie that he might get him a part-time job there. Apparently they were understaffed, and Ben offered a place to richie as well, but he insisted on finding something less boring. Eddie thought Richie was being dumb – he couldn’t afford to be so picky right now.

 

”Stop pouting Eddie Spaghetti, I promise to take the place if I don’t find anything else,” he told Eddie, messing up his already messy hair some more.

 

Ben promised Eddie that he’d talk to the owner of the shop the first thing next day and tell Mike or Bev what the responce was. Eddie thought that people were being too nice and generous and things weren’t supposed to be this easy – especially considering that he was on the run away from home. When people ran away from their homes, they faced troubled, yet Eddie hadn’t come across a single one yet – he had gotten almost suspiciously lucky.

 

”Okay, now tell me what’s wrong,” Richie said when they had arrived at Mike’s grandfather’s farm. Mike’s grandfather had been sort of strict, but nice enough and Eddie got along with him just fine. He didn’t have any problem with them staying there for a bit, and Eddie promised that they could pay rent or something, just so they weren’t being too much of a bother.

 

”Why do you assume something is wrong?” Eddie asked as he watched Richie pull a new, sort of clean T-shirt over his head. Unlike Eddie, Richie didn’t have any problem with changing his clothes in front of Eddie, and while Eddie normally blushed and looked away, now the room was dark and he didn’t feel so embarrassed.

 

”You’re being quiet, plus you have that glazed look in your eyes. That’s the number one give away that all’s not right in spaghetti-town.”

 

Eddie rolled his eyes at Richie’s choice of words, before letting his back hit the bed he was sitting on and stared at the ceiling. ”Just wondering how easy everything’s been – like there has been no cutbacks, no probelms the entire time since we left. Don’t you think it’s weird? I thought we’d face a lot more problems.”

 

”Yeah, so did I, but why are you complaining?” Richie asked as he joined Eddie on the bed. ”It doesn’t get any easier than this, so why can’t you just enjoy the fact that everything is going well?”

 

”Because I feel like everything’s going to go wrong soon.”

 

Richie yawned. ”If they do, we figure it out then. Now’s not the time to worry about what could be and what should be – you should just enjoy what is and not worry about anything else.”

 

Eddie crinkled his nose. ”Never talk philosophical to me again.”


End file.
